


Promise

by TheLittleMuse



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Gen, Human Disaster Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi Needs a Hug, Obi-Wan Kenobi is a Mess, Obi-Wan tries to be a good parent, The Jedi Council is not helpful, With sprinklings of bittersweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-23
Updated: 2020-01-23
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:40:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22375831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLittleMuse/pseuds/TheLittleMuse
Summary: Anakin needed love like he needed air. Obi-Wan did not know how to give it for he had never received it.
Relationships: Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker, Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker
Comments: 2
Kudos: 108





	Promise

_“Promise me you will train the boy … he is the Chosen One.”_

_“Yes Master.”_

…

There was a black pit in Obi-Wan’s chest. Obi-Wan filled it with his purpose – his Master’s last request, _Promise me you will train the boy._ Anakin was the reason Obi-Wan ate, slept, showered or did anything. When the concerned looks of his friends or the nagging of healers wasn’t enough to get him moving the responsibility of teaching and simply keeping the boy alive did. It was a heavy burden to place on child and Obi-Wan supposed that made him a failure of a Jedi.

His padawan’s braid had been cut in a quick ceremony after his Master’s funeral and far from the pride and joy he should have been feeling he had been stuck between crying and yelling at the Council Members who projected nothing but calm as if the world had not just been shaken at its core.

And so Obi-Wan was a Jedi Knight, and not just a Jedi Knight, he had a padawan. A padawan who simultaneously was the reason he did anything and one that some days he couldn’t help but hate.

A Jedi does not hate.

_I will train him. I take Anakin as my Padawan learner._

_An apprentice, you have, Qui-Gon. Impossible, to take on a second._

_Obi-Wan is ready._

He had been swept aside in a heartbeat.

But that resentment slowly faded away, Anakin was easy to love and Obi-Wan’s resistance crumbled easily. He was not, however, an easy padawan. Anakin’s grief at the loss of his mother was to be expected, Obi-Wan didn’t judge him for that as some of the other Masters did, he understood that even Jedi, taught to let go of attachments, grieved, and Anakin was not a Jedi, not yet, he was a boy in a strange cold place with strange cold people.

But Anakin’s grief was overwhelming and Obi-Wan didn’t know how to cope with it. Obi-Wan considered telling Anakin _I understand, I miss Qui-Gon too._ But it wasn’t the same. Qui-Gon wasn’t his father. Qui-Gon never loved him as Shmi loved Anakin.

Obi-Wan assumed (hoped) that this grief would pass with time (it didn’t).

And then there was Anakin’s behaviour – the wildness of an ex-slave testing the limits of his new-found ‘freedom’. Obi-Wan didn’t know whether he was being too strict or too lenient. Obi-Wan had always found comfort in the Code but it was clear that Anakin found the rules and philosophies he was expected to understand and obey confusing and unfair. Obi-Wan spent most of his time explaining things that Anakin should have already learnt ( _perhaps the boy was too old_ ). It was a struggle not to get irritated sometimes and he desperately hoped that Anakin, with his rapidly growing sensitivity and lack of shielding, could not sense his frustration.

_He did. He knew._

When he asked the other Masters for help he was only faced with reprimands and points on which Anakin was not measuring up. He stopped asking for help.

Then Anakin found out about the whole ‘Chosen One’ thing which caused him to burst into arrogance and panic in equal measure. Obi-Wan once again didn’t know what to do; how do you tell a child they may or may not be the child of prophecy brought about to bring balance to the Force (whatever that meant) according to a prophecy that may or may not bantha poodoo (opinions varied)?

Sometimes Obi-Wan wished Qui-Gon had been less ‘Qui-Gon’ about the whole matter.

Qui-Gon always followed the Force, but that sometimes meant he didn’t consider people.

…

When Anakin was ten he announced that he would never ever call another being ‘Master’. Obi-Wan understood; Anakin was a former slave and Master meant something different to him, so he took the proposal to the Council. The Council told Obi-Wan that they understood Anakin’s difficulty, of course, but they could not allow exceptions and how would Anakin ever fit in if he did not follow all the rules?

Defeated, Obi-Wan took the news to Anakin but promised Anakin that, at least in private he wouldn’t insist on the title of Master. Anakin nodded and declared that he would _never_ call Obi-Wan Master. Obi-Wan knew the reason but he couldn’t help feeling hurt, to him the title of Master was a mark of respect. It felt like his padawan was refusing to recognise him as a teacher and Obi-Wan, a painfully new Knight, still fresh from his own Master’s rejection, then his death, needed that validation in a way he would not admit. Anakin, however, knew that Obi-Wan could never be a ‘Master’; he was nothing like Watto or the Hutts, but as he got older, as his memories of slavery became fuzzier as childhood memories do, he realised that the title of Master meant something different to Obi-Wan. It made Obi-Wan happy to be called Master and Anakin cared about Obi-Wan’s happiness.

Anakin decided he wanted to be a Master.

…

_I don’t sleep much anymore_

_Because of your mother?_

Obi-Wan could sympathise with bad dreams. He still had dreams of long walkways, a burning hole in his Master’s chest and his Master’s voice, “If only you were faster, stronger, you could have saved me.”

_Dreams pass with time_

Anakin knew this wasn’t true. Despite Obi-Wan’s best efforts to be quiet Anakin had often woken to the sound of Obi-Wan making himself tea at some odd hour.

After the war started there were many nights when they sat up together, drinking tea and enjoying the silence of space.

…

They called him the Perfect Jedi. The Negotiator. Most of it was exaggerations from the Holonet, but it seemed to trickle into the Temple and he was held up as an example of emotional control, his missions played back as lessons and padawans were told to watch his perfect form in Soresu.

How could Obi-Wan tell them that, far from emotional control he was in constant turmoil? The war seemed to go on without end, an utterly, utterly pointless war, which destroyed every planet it was fought on, where he had to watch his friends die, send men to die, and now they were sending padawans onto the battlefield because there were too few Jedi. Children. His missions were used as lessons, but from what he could see there were never any wins. He was merely holding ground in a war of attrition.

_There was a black pit in Obi-Wan’s chest._

Anakin agreed with every bit of propaganda that portrayed Obi-Wan as the Perfect Jedi, he was wise, calm, kind, an excellent teacher and a loyal friend. Everything Anakin thought a Jedi should be (not like … others on the Council). There was just one problem; how could he talk to Obi-Wan about the constant anger he felt? Could a Jedi like Obi-Wan understand, maybe even sympathise, without judging him? Without thinking he was Dark?

And then there was Padmé. Anakin would have liked to believe that Obi-Wan wouldn’t report him to the Council, that he would put friendship above duty, but Obi-Wan believed in Duty, believed in the Order, believed in the Code. Anakin couldn’t risk it.

…

“I’m just going out to – uh.”

Obi-Wan tried to look even more engrossed in his book and waved a hand absently. Anakin _really_ wasn’t as subtle he thought he was. Obi-Wan allowed himself a small smile as Anakin rushed out the door. Maybe it made him a bad Master but he couldn’t take that small bit of happiness from him, his attachment. Obi-Wan couldn’t ever let on to Anakin that he knew because then he might have to confront him.

He should. He knew that attachment was forbidden, that attachment led to the Dark Side, Anakin was in danger, as Anakin’s former Master and friend Obi-Wan should protect Anakin even if that meant hurting him, but the problem was Obi-Wan just couldn’t work out why attachment was dangerous. Padmé gave Anakin a stability that, as much as he hated to admit it, he couldn’t, that the Jedi Order couldn’t.

That in itself was dangerous. Obi-Wan knew that the Code had a history, that it had been changed, that it was malleable, but the Code was his rock, his foundation and in this time more than any other, he needed it to be unshakable.

If the Code came loose there would be no more Obi-Wan Kenobi.

…

The Jedi were never meant to be soldiers, which was possibly why they were so bad at it. They were peacekeepers who happened to carry lightsabers. Despite their reputation as fearsome warriors there were relatively few Jedi that were truly skilled fighters. Many concentrated on other skills, but as the war progressed fighting skills were needed a lot more. Even an average Jedi could outfight a hundred droids.

But they were not soldiers, were never meant to be soldiers and so mistakes were made, and so came the Hardeen incident.

Even before the war Obi-Wan was familiar with the needs of an undercover mission, the needs of secrecy and the pain that came with it and so Obi-Wan did his duty, but in doing so he did something he swore he would never do, he hurt Anakin, broke his trust in a way he didn’t think would be fixable.

He could be a coward and blame the Council for the decision, but he always had the option to refuse.

They were fighting to save the Republic, to save the Jedi, yet Obi-Wan wondered what they lost along the way.

…

Attachment, Obi-Wan thought, was a curious thing. They were taught to avoid it, to fear it, and yet they were attached to the Order, to the Code, to each other. One great web of Jedi, existing in the Force together. Except Anakin didn’t. Nine years-old wasn’t so different from the normal four or five, but the age in which he entered the Order had made a difference with his peers. Already a padawan and yet so behind with everything. Anakin had never said anything as a child but Obi-Wan knew enough about being ostracised as a child to recognise it in his apprentice. The status of Chosen One made him stand apart in another way. Everyone was watching him, waiting for his prophesied power to burst forth and he _was_ powerful, astonishingly so, but for those around him and for Anakin himself, it was not enough. The Chosen One could have no faults and be impossibly powerful, yet still the perfect Jedi. Anakin just stood apart. Obi-Wan wanted, desperately, to find the words, to do something to help his brother feel a part of the whole. To not feel the rejection and anger and bitterness he felt in his former padawan, but Anakin just slipped and slid away. He was always just Anakin and Obi-Wan could not find the words.

…

_You were my brother, Anakin. I loved you._

Obi-Wan told Yoda he could not kill Anakin and he was telling the truth. He could not kill Anakin. Whether it would have been kinder to kill him than leave him burning, festering in his hate, waiting for Darth Vader to emerge in full, he could not say.

Everyone was dead. Who was there to judge him?

Technically, they won. The Separatists have been destroyed, with only the slight inconvenience of the fall of the Republic, the rise of the Empire and death of everyone he held close in the process.

There was a black pit in Obi-Wan’s chest.

_I HATE YOU._

…

There was only one thing left to do now. One final task for a failed Jedi. Take Luke, protect Luke, watch over Luke, teach Luke, make sure Luke was loved, for he was loved as a son in the Lars’ household and he liked to think that Anakin would appreciate that if he still had the capacity to appreciate such things.

It was a simple task and perhaps the most important one he had ever undertaken. It was redemption if he can be allowed such a thing.

…

_If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you could ever imagine._

A Jedi should not seek death, nor should they fear it, nevertheless there was a powerful sense of relief at coming to his end. His work was done. He wished he could have seen Anakin one last time, but it was Vader who was going to end him and there was nothing of his former padawan in this cold, hateful being (and Palpatine has finally taught Anakin how to get his emotions under control. He would have laughed if there was anything to laugh at).

But Obi-Wan had given Luke time to flee and that was all that mattered.

…

_There’s good in him, I know it_.

Anakin died. Darth Vader lived. There was no good left in Darth Vader. This, Obi-Wan knew. He knew it because he had to know it. _Anakin died_. If Anakin lived, then all of Vader’s deeds were Anakin’s. The selfless, kind man he knew who would have died for his friends in a heartbeat was the same being who had destroyed whole systems in his quest for domination as a tool of the Emperor.

Anakin was Vader and Vader was Anakin. There was still good in Vader; a Fallen being still remembered the Light, after all. Vader still remembered Anakin he just chose Vader. That was the tragedy of the thing.

He could not stop loving Anakin, but he could preserve his memory. Anakin died. From a certain point of view.

Anakin always did love surprising him.

_Tell your sister, you were right about me._

…

There was no black pit in Obi-Wan’s chest, partly because he no longer had a chest, but mostly because he was at peace at last.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been tweaking this for ages and I'm still not happy with it but I needed to post or I'm going to go mad.


End file.
